the religion of the book is not called islam. it is very heavily fictionalized. >> have you ever regretted writing it? >> i have been asked this question once a week for 24 years. the answer will always be no. i think it is a good buck. -- good book. people are finally being able to read it as a novel. young people, they are just coming to it fresh. some people love it, some people do not like it. >> you did not have an ordinary life. you were in hiding. you had an alias. what was your state of mind? >> very up and down. the first couple of years were very difficult. going back and looking at my journals at that time, which i have not looked at since then, it is quite obvious the person writing the journal's is very often in a state of the depression. it got easier, i felt, once i was able to begin to organize some kind of political resistance and develop a campaign with the help of a couple of human rights organizations and france to try to put pressure on european and -- your pet -- european governments to put pressure on the i